Our view: Democrats' lawsuit makes little sense

Published 8:00 pm, Tuesday, September 28, 2004

The lawsuit filed by the Bay County Democratic Party in federal court asking that provisional ballots be counted before they are verified is absurd and will only lead to more confusion among voters and election officials alike.

The Democrats filed the suit against Secretary of State Terry Lynn Land, asking that she rescind her instructions to the states 2,438 election officials telling them not to count provisional ballots of people who show up at the wrong polling locations.

Provisional ballots are provided to people who do not appear on a precincts registration list. If a person is in the correct location, then the vote will count after eligibility is determined. If the voter is determined to be in the wrong location, the vote will not count.

The Democrats want all the votes counted, even among people who are not eligible to vote in that particular precinct, if they are in the correct city, village or township. That would not be fair, since different precinct delegates, possibly different ballot issues, among other decisions unique to different precincts, are determined by eligible voters, not ineligible ones.

We dont believe that it should be that hard for a person to locate the correct polling station, particularly after being told where the correct location is, to warrant a change to this law. Just as it would be wrong to not count eligible ballots, it would be wrong to count ineligible ones.